House on Forgotten Hill | House of Secrets #4 | Ebook

Pre-Order, Releasing August 28.

The last thing Olivia Nightingale's mother ever said changed everything.

“Your father didn't die in an accident. He was murdered.”

Now alone in the world, Olivia finds herself drawn back to the one place that still connects her to the family she's lost. When her childhood home unexpectedly comes up for sale, she uses the inheritance her mother left behind to buy it.

At first, the neighborhood feels just as she remembers it.

But beneath the familiar faces and quiet streets, old secrets still linger.

As the past slowly begins to unravel, Olivia discovers that the biggest secrets weren't hidden inside the house ... they were hidden in plain sight.

Readers of the House of Secrets Series Say:

"I loved every moment." ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"The ending was a 10/10 — totally unexpected in the best way." ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"Such a fast read, only because I couldn't put it down!" ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"Another great read." ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"I look forward to many more." ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

CHAPTER ONE

My name is Olivia Nightingale, and this is my story.

My maiden name is Caraway, but we’ll get to that later.

It has been one month since my mother, Naomi Caraway, died.

I never imagined that by age thirty-two, I would have lost both of my parents and found myself all alone in the world. I’ve had other people in my life, of course. Friends and coworkers, and a few relatives I spoke to every now and then.

But they weren’t my parents.

My father, Julian Caraway, died when I was twelve years old. I remember the day it happened with a clarity that has never faded, although there are other parts of my childhood I can’t recall.

It was late afternoon, and it was raining outside. I was sitting cross-legged on the living room floor, watching television while I worked on a school project, when someone knocked on the front door.

My mother was in the kitchen.

“I’ll get it,” she called.

I heard the faucet shut off, followed by the quick shuffle of her slippers across the tile. A moment later, the front door opened.

At first, no one said anything.

Then a man spoke. “Mrs. Caraway?”

Something about his voice made me look up.

There were two police officers standing on the porch. One was older, with thinning gray hair and a mustache. The other appeared much younger. His gaze drifted past my mother and settled on me before moving back to her again.

Even at twelve, I understood what it meant when police officers came to your house. It meant something terrible had happened. My mother must have understood too, because she reached for the doorframe as though she needed it to remain standing.

“What is it?” she asked. “What’s happened?”

The older officer removed his hat.

There are moments in life when time seems to slow, stretching a few seconds into something far longer. I remember the officer’s mouth moving. I remember hearing the words car accident. I remember my mother saying my father’s name.

Then my mother’s legs gave way.

She sagged to the floor, and the younger officer stepped forward, trying to catch her before she struck the hardwood. I remained frozen in the living room, a bottle of glue still clutched in one hand.

My father was dead.

He had left for work that morning wearing a blue button-down shirt and a striped tie. Before walking out the door, he had kissed my mother, then bent to kiss the top of my head.

“See you tonight, sweetheart,” he’d said.

But I never saw him again.

For the next several months, my mother almost never left her bedroom. Some mornings, I would pause outside her closed door and listen for movement. If I heard nothing, I would knock, then let myself inside where I’d often find her beneath the covers, staring at the wall.

I brought her toast she didn’t eat and tea she allowed to grow cold. I reminded her when she needed to take a shower. I washed our clothes, heated canned soup for dinner, and learned how to write checks when bills arrived in the mail.

I was only twelve.

I didn’t know how to care for a grieving woman.

I barely knew how to care for myself.

Still, I tried.

At night, I lay in bed, my tears soft and quiet because I feared if she heard me and the pain I was in, it would make her worse. Sometimes I pressed my face into the pillow to muffle the sound. Other times, I stared at the ceiling and wondered what would happen if my mother never got better.

Then one day, she did.

Or perhaps she only learned how to function again.

One morning, I came downstairs and found her standing at the stove, making scrambled eggs. Her hair was brushed. She wore jeans and a pale-yellow sweater, and although she looked thinner than she had before my father died, there was more life in her face.

“Morning, dear,” she said. “Are you hungry?”

I nodded, and she placed a plate in front of me and sat across the table while I ate. Neither of us said much, but I remember feeling hopeful for the first time in months.

My mother began leaving the house again after that. She went grocery shopping. She answered the phone when it rang. She even returned to work part-time and started hanging around with her friends again.

But looking back now, I can admit she was never the same after he died.

The woman who had once filled the house with music stopped turning on the radio. She stopped laughing. It was as if she was resolved to live a mediocre life.

The first major decision she made after my father’s death was to sell our house, even though I begged for us to stay. The house was the only home I had ever known. It was where my father had taught me to ride a bicycle in the driveway. Where he’d built a wooden swing beneath the large oak tree in the backyard. Where the three of us had eaten pancakes every Sunday morning and played cards at the dining room table when storms knocked out the electricity.

I liked walking past my father’s office and picturing him sitting behind his desk. I liked opening the hall closet and catching the faint scent of the coat he used to wear. I liked standing in the kitchen and remembering the way he danced whenever my mother played one of her favorite songs.

Every room held a memory.

Wonderful memories that comforted me but caused pain for her.

“It hurts too much to stay here,” she told me. “I hope you understand.”

I didn’t, but she listed the house anyway.

Several weeks later, it sold, and we packed our lives into cardboard boxes and moved several states away to live near my mother’s sister. I’ll never forget watching our old house disappear through the rear window of the car until the road curved and there was nothing left to see.

We moved into a modest house a few blocks from my aunt’s house, and I’ve lived in the same state ever since. There were times when I considered leaving, and I almost did when I was in college. Then I met Adrian Nightingale. I was twenty-two, and he swept into my life so fast I didn’t have time to consider whether I wanted him there. He was charming and attentive.

Within six months, we were engaged.

Three months later, we were married.

As charming and attentive as Adrian was to me, it wasn’t long before his interest switched from me to someone else, another girl I knew from school. And less than a year of marriage, we divorced.

There was no sentimental reason behind the decision to keep his last name. By then, I had become accustomed to being Olivia Nightingale, and returning to Caraway felt like taking a step backward instead of a step forward.

Sitting at my mother’s table now, with a cup of coffee in my hand, I thought about how much different the house felt without her in it.

Rain streaked the windows, just like it had when my father died.

It had also rained the last time I spoke to my mother before her death.

By then, she had been in the hospital for almost two weeks. Her doctors had warned me that the end was near, but it was hard for me to accept. In the years since my father’s death, my mother had always seemed stronger than any woman I’d ever known. Even when she grew frail, some part of me expected her to recover.

On the final night of her life, I sat beside her bed, holding her hand while the machines surrounding her hummed and beeped.

For most of the evening, she said little, offering a few words of encouragement and then telling me she loved me.

Then, shortly before midnight, her eyes opened.

“Olivia,” she whispered.

I leaned closer. “I’m here.”

She tried to speak again, but the words were too faint for me to understand.

“What is it, Mom?”

Her fingers tightened around mine. “Come closer.”

I stood and bent over the bed until my ear was only inches from her mouth.

Her breath trembled against my cheek.

“Your father didn’t die in an accident,” she whispered.

I pulled back, certain I had misheard her. “What?”

She looked directly into my eyes. “He was murdered.”